Re: OMG!

["Frank Townsend" <ftownsen@iamdigex.net>]

"Sheldon Simms" <sheldon@interprice.com> wrote in message
20010507.191249.841148365.13631@ip148.interprice.vi">news:20010507.191249.841148365.13631@ip148.interprice.vi...
> Im Artikel <20010507.181001.841148365.13435@ip148.interprice.vi> schrieb
> "Sheldon Simms" <sheldon@interprice.com>:
>
>
> > Im Artikel <RCxJ6.20265$Aj1.8134559@typhoon2.ba-dsg.net> schrieb "Frank
> > Townsend" <ftownsen@iamdigex.net>:
> >
> >> Attorney's fees and costs may be awarded at the discretion of the court
> >> (17 USC 505)
> > Yes of course. I only speculate that this discretion would not be
> > exercised in such a case.
>
> On further reading, it seems to me that unless the software in question
> was registered with the Copyright Office, that there is no possibility
> of statutory damages or attorney's fees being awarded. (17 USC 412)
>
> If that is the case, then for unregistered software, damages would be
> limited to actual damages, which would be nothing.

Not so fast!  Damages have nothing to do with whether or not an item is
available through commercial channels (ie, "on the shelf").  That is one way
of establishing value, but there are others:  expert testimony, valuations
of the work on the used market, etc.  Your own statements indicate that you
would pay $2 for a legitimately available copy, so you have already
impeached the credibility of your new argument that the value of a piece of
Apple II software is $0.  Furthermore, you and others have already argued
that the software is so valuable that it would be a travisty if it were lost
to posterity.  Which one of your statements is a falsehood?

> How many of the old programs on Asimov do you think were registered with
> the Copyright Office?

Probably most that were sold through a publisher.  Any title can be checked
at the Copyright Office web site.

Of course, the analysis you are making now is the same that a shoplifter or
any other would-be criminal might make:  what is the liklihood that I will
be caught, and if so, what is the worst that could happen ;-))